Good morning, everyone.

Some weeks, the news is slow in Alberta. This was not one of those weeks.

Usually, when a government invokes (for the second time in a month) the notwithstanding clause to shield legislation from judicial oversight, that would be the biggest story of the week.

Not this time.

Or if the Auditor-General were to release a report that said the province wasted more than $100-million on a deal to privatize medical labs, despite being warned by its own public service that the much-touted cost savings were a mirage, that would dominate the news cycle.

Nope. Not in Alberta this week.

Heck, even when word came down that Premier Danielle Smith’s government was on the verge of signing an accord with Ottawa that would involve an oil pipeline running from Alberta to the northwest coast of British Columbia, that too was secondary to a big scoop for The Globe and Mail.

On Tuesday morning, Globe Alberta correspondent Carrie Tait reported that the United Conservative government had plans to create a hybrid health care model that could see doctors in the province work in the public system while also maintaining a fully private practice.

The massive shift in how health care could be delivered in Alberta was outlined in draft amendments to the Alberta Health Care Insurance Act obtained by The Globe. The changes, not yet finalized, let alone tabled, describe three paths for doctors to practise in the province: those billing the public purse for their services, paid at rates set by the government; those setting their own rates and billing patients privately; and those toggling between the public and private systems.

Simply put, the draft amendments would transform and establish a model for medicine unlike any in the country.

The document obtained by The Globe is marked as draft 11 and dated Nov. 5, with other notes indicating edits were still being considered in the amendments. And while the government had little to say about a hybrid health care model, Maddison McKee, a spokeswoman for Adriana LaGrange, Alberta’s Minister of Primary and Preventative Health Services, said the government remains committed to its pledge to protect public health care, stating “that under no circumstances will any Albertan ever have to pay out of pocket to see their family doctor or to get the medical treatment they need.”

(The words “have to” are doing a lot of work in the statement.)

Given that public health care is perhaps the third rail of politics in Canada, it was unsurprising to see critics lining up about the proposed changes.

“This is definitely two-tiered medicine,” said Braden Manns, a professor of health policy at the University of Calgary.

Jon Meddings, a former dean of the University of Calgary’s medical school, said few doctors opt out of Medicare in Alberta because, under the existing legislation, it is financially risky.

“This has protected our public system,” he said.

But he said the proposed hybrid system could allow physicians to test the private waters without risking their entire income.

Then, on Wednesday, the Premier posted a video on social media in which she touted the new model, focusing solely on surgeries. Given the province’s increasing reliance on private surgical facilities, that should come as no surprise.

The Globe’s André Picard wasn’t buying it, however.

“These ‘steam valve’ arguments are well-worn: The claim is that allowing wealthier patients to pay for access to care will remove them from public wait lists and result in faster care for all,” he wrote. “But there little evidence this is true.”

He pointed to a 1998 study in Manitoba that examined wait times for cataract surgery. The study found that clinics offering both publicly and privately funded cataract surgery had wait times as much as 13 weeks longer than practices that offered only publicly funded services.

“Why? Because the more lucrative private cases always took precedence. Result: Waits were longer over all.”

While nothing has been finalized yet, The Globe’s Gary Mason argues in his column that Canada’s health care system is a mess, so solutions are needed.

“Alberta deserves credit for at least giving the public-private model a chance,” he wrote. “Hopefully, it can improve a system that is slowly crumbling under the weight of demand.”

This is the weekly Alberta newsletter written by Alberta bureau chief Mark Iype. If you’re reading this on the web, or it was forwarded to you from someone else, you can sign up for it and all Globe newsletters here.